4. Experiment: The Case Study
The petrochemical process industries represent a significant contribution to the world economy.
Companies in this industry produce a wide variety of products, including ethylene, vinyl
chloride, styrene monomer, propylene, benzene, toluene, and xylene, which are the raw materials
for many plastics. Producing these chemicals involves handling hazardous materials and
managing large amounts of energy. Because of these conditions, when something goes wrong at
a petrochemical processing facility, it can have catastrophic consequences.
The requirement to develop a formal HSEE case for any major petrochemical facility has
been in place for many years in regulated environments such as Iran. Today, petrochemical industry and companies associations are applying this requirement in other regions of the world
where such legislation does not currently exist. This provides an opportunity to learn from
experience and develop concise and pragmatic HSEE cases. Well-developed HSEE cases not
only protect lives and the environment, but help a business manage its assets, maintain its
competency and reduce the risk of lost production. The case study was conducted for a
petrochemical company in the northwest of Iran to show how to evaluate the impacts of RE
concept on HSEE factors. The company is one of the largest petrochemical industries are located
in Iran that produces olefins by steam cracking of natural gas liquids like ethane and propane.
Aromatics are produced by catalytic reforming of naphtha. Olefins and aromatics are the
building-blocks for a wide range of materials such as solvents, detergents, and adhesives. Olefins
are the basis for polymers and oligomers used in plastics, resins, fibers, elastomers, lubricants,
and gels.
As mentioned before, the forms of answers given to the two parts (A and B) are linguistic.
After converting Z-numbers data into classical fuzzy data set, they are converted into crisp one.
Cronbach's alpha is calculated to determine the reliability of questionnaires. Cronbach's alpha is
calculated using SPSS v.22.0. The results are shown in Table 4.